Use those scraps!

 Hi everyone!

I haven't had a tonne of time to craft, which means I've had even less time to tidy up my craft room! This summer, I did a bit of a clean. One of my goals was to group my UFOs (Un-Finished Objects) together. Well... I have too many to do that. But I did nab all the loose odds and ends at least and put them in my treasure box of bits and bobs. (Full disclosure... except Christmas. I have a separate box of bits and bobs for that!)

The box is too full! That means, it's time to sort through it and pull out things to use or donate. So, as I was making, I decided to just turn my camera on and show you what I do. (Maybe you'll finally understand why I'm such a SLOW crafter! I just can't make up my mind on patterns and colours.)

In this intro video, we're sifting through my box of bits and bobs. I encourage you to sift through your leftover goodies and pick somethings to work with too! 

Here is my video!

https://youtu.be/a8m2PevrvIo

In subsequent videos, I will make a project (likely all cards!) with the group of things I pulled out to use, so do check back! There will be a whole series of videos. Typically, anything left from what I pulled out will get donated.

After all is said and done, do let me know which scrap bits project was your favourite!

All the best to you, internet denizens.

One for the Lovebirds

 I'm back again, Internet Denizens!

This scrapbook album is BIG. Since it for a wedding, I wanted it to be able to hold some showcase photos at an 8 x 10 inch size. So, a handful of 8 x 10 inch photos can fit in this 8.5 x 10.5 inch album, but the main photo size is to use a mix of 5 x 7 inch photos and two 4 x 6 inch photos.

The wedding was in February 2026 and I finished the album just about a week before the event so the filming is not the best. (I was in a hurry!) The paper collection by Paper Rose was just stunning. The wedding colours were navy blue, blush pink, and sage green. The blue in this collection is actually an indigo blue, but I couldn't pass it up. It's just beautiful and still looks great with navy.

The cover paper is just so gorgeous that I didn't do a thing to it. Not even a title, as it's self explanatory!

I made a matching card but I photographed it about the night before the event, so it's photo is from late at night and not very good. My craft room was a disaster from creating the album that I had to take the picture on the floor. Sorry for the quality!

I used the second sheet of the cover paper to tie the card back to the album. I hope they kept it in a tuck spot in there! While it is three dimensional, it does fold flat to go in an envelope, so it could go in a tuck spot or pocket in the album.

Here is the video!

https://youtu.be/jj-TraswOGM

Enjoy!

Finally - One for the boys!

 Hello Internet World again!

This next make I'm sharing is a baby album I made for a baby BOY! So many paper crafting goodies are aimed at women as it is the largest demographic market that consumes the goods. But we need to make for the men too. Personally, I find that most male-themed... well... anything, not just paper crafting, tends to be very stereotypical.

Luckily though, when it comes to babies, there are iconic baby things that are gender neutral or that have an established boy vs. girl version. I know, I know, boy vs. girl is not-so-much a thing these days, but mom and dad declared baby a boy. 

I am toooo slow of a crafter to create in advance of when a baby is born! My August 2023 baby girl album was for a baby already about 3 years old. My late 2025 one made it just in time before baby's 2nd birthday. And this one was around the same mark, I believe.

Here is the album!

And here is the video!

https://youtu.be/-p6obl6gwXU

My favourite part is constructing the album. Decorating goes much slower. I have been improving my build designs in tiny increments, but I'm quite happy with my sewn ribbon signatures. The tweak on this design is the size. This baby boy album is 6.5 x 8.5 inches. It is intended for standard 4 x 6 inch photos, but it can accommodate some 5 x 7 inch photos.

I hope you are getting some inspiration from these albums. 

Keep well!

Scrapbook Albums! - I've made a few

 Hello Internet World!

Sorry I have been missing in action. I do still create, just at a much much slower pace. I'll be sharing some of my latest YouTube videos here so you can see some of the things I've been up to.

Most recent to my last post, I started working on some baby mini-albums. Well, they were not truly that  mini. After the first baby girl album in August 2023, I made another that I posted towards the end of 2025. The cover is a shaker front with a sweet Penny Black bunny image that I watercoloured on it.

Here is the video.

https://youtu.be/Qe6h_VobhMw?si=MfR6L1OLle5n5U9M

Stay tuned! I have more things scheduled to share. If you return to visit me, THANK-YOU! I am so grateful for the inspiration I glean from other creators online that I like to show what has come of it in what I've made too.

Keep well.

House Shaped Easel Card - Happy Diwali

I saw this house shaped card video by Jennifer McGuire and remembered I have a Top Dog Die (now out of business) that is a house shape. It's 5 x 7 so I knew I could make a shaped card out of it. So, I shopped my stash! I knew I had a lot of smaller dies I could use with this house but I did keep it pretty simple.

Easel cards is the theme of my next card making class. I did a slimline card class in October as my first class in 2 years. The kit was a repeat for those who didn't make it to my class in October 2019, but I did change up one of the card to use a new stamp set. But - that's a story for another day!

When I made the sample for my easel card class, I realized the string of lights could be perfect for Diwali! Lights play an important role in this holiday for several religions. I have a co-worker who celebrates both Diwali and Christmas. So, I made this card for her.

I have an alphabet set of "Lego-like" peg stamps that click together, so I knew I could spell out Diwali. For my Christmas versions of the house cards, I spelled out "holidays" to go with the "Happy". I also have a giant "Noel" stamp, so I cut that from the red satin finish cardstock and then spelled "Joyeux" to go with it so I have a French language option too! The size of the big word stamps fill the rooftops of these houses perfectly, or else they would have looked like a big void.

While my holiday houses have more greenery, I opted for more light strings for the Diwali version. I cut them from white cardstock and coloured them with copics and glitter pens. The bulbs are all glittery. I also used my lamp post die. I rarely get to use it, even though I love the lantern-style of the lamp posts. Behind these ones, I put some alcohol inked paper that I did over pearl card I made. So, it's a shiny alcohol ink blend of yellows and oranges.

I love how easel cards display themselves. This way, you can see the warm sentiment inside and enjoy the outside of the card at the same time!

There are A LOT of windows on this card, each with 3 steps: The window frame, some vellum, some blue cardstock. The vellum is very subtle but it does help give that window pane glass look.

I have lots of dies that can make shaped cards. I just never have the inspiration to get up and do it! But this time I did! I will try to remember to share my holiday versions later in the year!

Heat Embossing Techniques on Handmade Cards

 Hello crafty world! My creative crew wanted to practice some heat embossing techniques, so I've made some kits for 4 cards. These cards include:

• A regular, heat embossed sentiment
• A coloured, stamped sentiment overlaid with clear heat embossing
• Emboss Resist
• Watercolour emboss resist and lift
• A DIY embossing powder enamel shape
• Water splatter embossing
• Water coloured focal images with each image heat embossed on watercolour paper 
• Watermark stamping

My favourite is the water splatter embossing. The bear from Penny Black stamps is just so amazing. Penny Black makes great stamps for colouring because the spaces are big. I think that if you swap out the sentiment on this card, it could make a great sympathy card too.

 

The teddy bears from Penny Black are just adorable, including this tea cup one. This card features the emboss resist lift. First you colour the background, then you clear emboss on it, then you mist it with water and sop up some of the exposed colour. 

 

This one is the watermark - no embossing powder.

And this one is the same background stamp but as emboss resist. I clear embossed on plain white cardstock and then inkblended over top after. I put the house die cut in my mini pancake maker and melted gold embossing powder on it. Then I sprinkled on some white embossing powder and swirled it with a toothpick.

 Which one is your favourite card? Which technique is your favourite heat embossing technique?

DIY Mini Envelope

 I've been having fun using up paper scraps to make mini-envelopes as embellishments for my cards. I figured out how to make the medium sized one with the Envelope Punch Board. But I also wanted some mini ones so I figured how to do that on the Scor Pal score board, with out the Scor Envi guide.

Tah-dah! This size of DIY envelope is a bit smaller than the currently popular Envelope of Wonder die by Spellbinders. I did make one the same size as the Envelope of Wonder, but I find it a little big. I made this as my mother-in-law's birthday card. I used a few Penny Black stamps and went for a watercolour look. I watercoloured the bird and then the flowers are a solid stamp, designed to look like you watercoloured them. The newsprint paper is among the last of the scraps I have for it. I love that paper!

I think I did okay with the watercolour. It's not my style but I've tried a few more since then. I do love that you only need 1 colour to get the variations by diluting with water. But, you don't get the same degree of control that you do with alcohol markers. It was fun to play around with something different though!

Do you like making mini-envelopes? What do you use yours for?

Scrap Paper Christmas Cards

If you're a paper crafter, you have scraps! I've been working away at my Christmas paper stash for a few years. I finally finished one pad off and another is about halfway there. I'm not going to buy pads again unless I love a lot of it or I'm making a mini album and I will use most of it for that singular project. I'm finally "low" on Christmas paper, but I picked up more from others who were offloading them, so it's still on the no-buy list unless I'm making an album.

So, this year, I've been saving up these scrappy card ideas and I made some Christmas and winter cards! I think they turned out great!

I started with the envelopes. Spellbinders has an "Envelope of Wonder" die set that is popular right now. But I knew I could make mini-envelopes on my own with my score board. I also knew I had tonnes of little shapes and stamps that I could stuff the envelope with. So, this is my take on it!

The first one is stuffed all with die cuts and a branch punch. For the second one, I cut out the snowman and ornaments from a paper pad. The trees, greenery, bird, and garlands are other die cuts I have. I used an embossing folder in the background for interest. The greeting is a hot foil stamp. I hot foiled it on the left and letterpressed it with pigment ink on the right. I don't have the matching die, so I cut it out by hand.

I had so much fun making envelopes in different sizes. The one above and the tiny mini envelopes were my favourites. The larger envelope uses a 4.5 inch square and the smaller one uses a 2.5 inch square. These use a decent amount of scraps! For the mini's, I coloured up a whole stamp set with my Copic markers and stuffed them inside the envelopes.

The next thing I tried were strip clusters. I had some left over strips and I've seen lots of YouTube videos for making your own cluster embellishments. Clusters are not my strong suit. I lean to clean and simple. I started with just layering up the strips. I made some paper stockings and these were the left overs. When I sat down to make cards, I pulled out the layered strips (pictured on the right). Then I just tried to match them with a focal image and a sentiment.

Although I tried to add some interest with the softly ink blended circle frame, this card still felt a bit too plain for me. It's fine for a masculine card, but it needed something more. So, for the next one, I embossed the background again and it made a big difference!

Then I did one more step with the embossing folders and used white pigment ink on top.

The last of the scrappy Christmas cards I made use the tried and true scrap strip background technique. You just keep layering strips next to each other to cover some amount of the background. Then I used an idea from Jill Foster (from the Penny Black YouTube channel). Penny Black has some sentiment dies that cut out only the top part of the word. So, I did some partial die cutting to mimic the effect. Their dies do a swooshy line. I could only achieve a straight line but I think it looks fine.

The "joyful" die by Hero Arts has a shadow. The shadow is what I partially die cut and then I cut the word from red foil cardstock. For the next batch, I don't have a shadow die. So, I just manually cut around the words. It's easier with words like these (from C.C. Rubber Stamps) that are not too frilly.

I finished all the cards off with some enamel dots - except the deer. It has flat stickers (I think they are vinyl). The "candy" style dots are from Queen and Co. and were actually marketed as beach balls. But I think they look like candies. The glitter dots are from my Your Next Stamp stash. (Your Next Stamp is closed now, sadly.)

I hope these scrap paper Christmas cards inspire you to work your stash this holiday season! I really like the bear on the strip cluster and the partial cut words on the strip backgrounds. What's your favourite?

Baby Girl Scrapbook Album XL

 Today, I'm sharing a baby scrapbook album I handmade.

I used ribbon for the bindings and sewed 6 signatures into a Kraft Tex cover. The onsie is an Accucut Craft die that I have. It appears several times throughout the album.

I used an eclectic mix of patterned papers, Doodlebug Stickers, die cuts, and my stamps in this album. I especially like this fold out page because... fairies!

This is another one of my favourite pages. I have a thing for arches. I really like how this teddy bear tag turned out. The quote is beautiful.

I just love these papers from Echo Park on this page spread. I made the crib myself from two different die cuts.

For the FULL video tour of this album, check out my video here:

Project Share: Baby Girl Scrapbook Album XL

 

Playing with Ink Blending on Handmade Cards

 Hello world! It's been a while since I posted any creations. Rest assured, I have been crafting but at a much reduced level for the last while. I have been experimenting with some new tools and techniques of late though, so I wanted to share some of that.

Today, I'm sharing some ink blending. The first up is a no-risk ink blended panel. There's no risk to this one because the panel is a separate piece. If it doesn't turn out the way you want it to, then you simply start over - no card ruined!

I used a purple and a pink about half'n'half. Then I used a blue at the top to blend over the lighter pink to create a bit of a purple hue to the blue. I used dye-based inks for this one. For this panel, I blended on Copic Xpress It paper because it's the smoothest card I have. The card background is embossed with a chevron patterned embossing folder. Since that adds texture, I thought simple, plain, smooth white cardstock die cuts would be just fine.

Don't have die cuts? No problem. On this version, I literally scribbled a tree line and some trees. Absolutely no skill required!

It's simple but effective, if you ask me!

On the next card, I did a traditionally blue sky. It was inspired by Michelle Short of the Card Grotto. See her card here: MFT Stenciling. Her cards are always a clean and sharp design that I really like.

This one was done with Distress Oxide inks directly onto the card front. I masked off the edges and used my homemade cloud stencil for the bottom edge.

I tried to make it cheerful and masculine but rainbow is just not my style. I find, every time I try something rainbow, I end up not liking it. I work better in monochrome, I guess. So, I did another with a stamped image as the focal.

I like this one better, but I feel like the border was a little bit too wide. Still turned out cute though! How could it not with the ever super cute stamp set from Lawn Fawn? (Really High Five stamp set.)

Lastly, I tried spotlight ink blending. I used the same stamp for the first attempt:

 This was also with Distress Oxide ink and a blending sponge. You can see marks - it's not that smooth. So, I tried again with a dye in and a blending brush instead and I like this result MUCH better. It's directly inspired by a card made by Gina K. Designs in this video: See snowman spotlight ink blended video.

Do you like to ink blend? What style is your favourite?

Discbound Notebook with the WRMK Mini Disc Cinch

I recently purchased the We R Memory Keepers Mini Disc Cinch. After playing around with it making a couple of prototypes, I made this disc bound notebook for a friend. I had seen others make DIY planners using Dollar Tree gift bags as covers, so I tried the same thing.

This is a gift set of goodies including the notebook, a bridge card, and a matchbook notepad. I also made tab dividers for the notebook with my WRMK envelope punch board and some coffee cup shaped paper clips.

You can watch my video walkthrough of this project and some thoughts on the Disc Cinch on my YouTube channel. Just click the picture!

Shadowbox 50th Birthday Card

One of our friends turned 50 this month, so I wanted to make him a special card. This is a true milestone for him and needed to be celebrated! I used the same template I made for my mother-in-law's birthday card (here: alcohol inked shadowbox birthday card). For that card, I inked up the whole sky with an alcohol ink technique.

For this one, I did regular ink blending with blending brushes.

 

Everything on this card started out as white cardstock. I used a grass mask by Lawn Fawn to make the grass line in the back. I used my homemade cloud stencil for the sky. The grass in the middle layer is a long grass die cut that I ink blended and the front layer is a short grass die cut that I also ink blended. 

 

Then I stamped the critters and coloured them with my alcohol ink markers and cut them out by hand. I dug into my stash to make this card! There's a whole medley of stamp sets! (It actually took quite a long time to make this card.) All the critters are from a Hello Bluebird stamp set. I found two gift stamps: a solid one and one I had to colour in. I used a Your Next Stamp balloon cluster image and I found a single balloon in another stamp set. I forget what stamp set the party hats are from, but boy they were REALLY TINY to colour in!

 

I knew I wanted a large 50 to be floating in the middle. I used acetate for that. Since cleaning my craft room, I put all my "leftover" bits (e.g. die cut but not used, stamped but not used, etc.) in what I'm calling my "bits box". So I dug in there and found the cupcake. I coloured that up and put it in!

I put a pocket on the back and wrote out a little poem for a sentiment on a separate sheet that I slipped into the pocket. I like how it turned out and our friend liked it too! I think it turned out fine for guys or gals, so I'm very happy with it!

Handmade Holiday Cards Received for 2021

 I thought I would show off the handmade cards I received for Christmas 2021 as my last post in the year. I love getting cards from my Creative Crew. I get to see their learning in action!

The first to arrive was Debbie's card. It's super glittery with a patterned glitter paper as the background. I cut tiny cardinals for Debbie. She just loves them. So, she made me a cardinal card!

The sentiment was left from the last card class we had together. The cardinal has glitter accents and the poinsettia is made from foiled paper. On the inside, she stamped an evergreen, put a golden start sequin at the top and put one of the tiny die cut cardinals inside.

The next card was from Norma. I seem to have a weakness for snowflakes so she made me a card full of them! Plus they have glitter accented ones in the paper too. Teal (leaning to blue) is my favourite colour, so this card speaks to me (and has only nice things to say)!

I got a lovely snowman card from Claire. Our last card class was an easel card class. So, she made a easel card to showcase what she learned! She stamped a happy snow-family and coloured it with alcohol markers.

You can see how the easel card stands in this image:

She put a die-cut greeting on the inside and her heartfelt message on the back of the card. I have the same die-cut greeting. I just love die-cut greetings. I think they stand out so well. You can also see in the second image how Claire added just a touch of sparkle to the snow with a glitter pen. All the falling snow is coloured in and there's some on the ground too.

The last handmade card I got was from Maria. Maria lives farther away so she doesn't get to come to the crafty classes, but she attends some near her with a local Stampin' Up! demonstrator. The colours are just gorgeous. It looks like she die cut some evergreens from some ink-smooshed papers. 

She arranged them on an embossed panel of trees. You can see the embossing better in the second photo. Her sentiment has been placed behind some vellum for a soft look and popped up on foam tape for dimension.

It's a very soft and serene card - also clean and simple looking, which is totally up my alley!

I am happy to have so many creative people around me. How about you? Did you get any handmade goodness this holiday?

Husky Christmas Card

 Our doggy had a big budget this year! I made a card for my husband to go with the gift our doggy bought him. The gift had to do with walking together in the winter, so I made a nice little winter scene.

Now, I don't ink blend often, but I do admire it! So, I decided to try it out. I bought this Clearly Besotted Holiday Huskies stamp set last year but didn't end up using it. I based my card off of a sample in another Clearly Besotted stamp set called Prancing Plushies. (Click the link to see their samples. Their plushie sets are adorable!)

I started out by cutting my tree masks. I used Avery Repositionable Labels from Staples (Business Depot). I bought a pack of it as 8.5 x 11 full sheets. This stuff is great! I used birch tree dies from Joy Crafts and a stitched hill from Creative Expressions.

Then I used mint tape from Scrapbook.com to mask a half-inch border on my card front. (Mint tape is like Post-It tape.) I used my glass mat grid lines and a ruler to help me get it straight. When the masking was done, it looked like this:

I used 3 colours of Distress Oxides to blend the sky (Salty Ocean, Blueprint Sketch, Chipped Sapphire). I bought these three colours years ago specifically for sky blending. This might be the 3rd time I've used them. (As I said, I'm not big on blending!) I used my make-up brush tool to blend. It look a long time to get a solid blend. In retrospect, I wish I had tried a foam dauber. It would put down ink faster, I think.

Here's what it looked like when the blending was done:

And then.... the big reveal!

From the Holiday Huskies stamp set, I chose two images and coloured them with my Copic Markers.

I had to colour the husky to look like our dog, Shadow! I cut out the images with scissors and then added a sentiment from the same stamp set to finish off the card.

Hubby liked it!

Do you make cards from your pets?